Lriver1004

Im looking at picking up a set of used kleemann headers for my e55 and they do not have the downpipe piece that connects to the stock exhaust. My question is will there be any performance loss if I have an exhaust shop bridge the headers to the stock exhaust with a piece of straight pipe? This will also eliminate the flange from the headers to the stock exhaust altogether. Any help would be greatly appreciated. THANKS!

PieRat

Shouldn't be a performance loss. Only consequence I could think of being possible would be extra stress on the welds from the motor torquing? I don't know if the flange allows some degree of flex, but I am doubtful. For example MBH long tubes weld straight onto the mid section so it must be fine!

Lriver1004

Thanks! I was thinking the same thing but I wanted to get a second opinion! I could have some flex pipes welded in there for reassurance.

PieRat

They prone to leaking and performance loss probs best to not bother or have a flange welded in so exhaust can be dropped if neccesary without removing headers (big job).

E55Greasemonkey

Most exhaust shops will crush bend that pipe and leave you with about a 2 1/4" diameter pipe. Yuck.

PieRat

Wont they just use a prebent mandel pieces? Thats what they do here..

Lriver1004

That's true, I didn't think about that.

Lriver1004

Havent seen many shops that use mandrel bends here. I would have to buy my own mandrel pieces and bring to them to weld up.

GinDistiller

I just did manifolds on my car, after having the secondary cats and resonator removed with an x pipe in place, and I can tell you that having a flange would have been really nice! It was comical to juggle a transmission jack in the center and tie down straps in the back to get the exhaust down one end at a time. My advice - have them put a flange in somewhere. If in the future you need flex disc work etc it will make life much easier, or less expensive if having a shop do work.

das eighty

Thinking of going with this setup as well. I have C63 mufflers though. How are you liking the sound? Any clips?

GinDistiller

It's too quiet! I thought I liked it until I realized a lot of the new sound was the crack that finally let go on one of the manifolds ha. It seems like it's 5-10% louder than stock. I've heard with the C63/E63 mufflers it sounds much better. Current debate is to do that, or wait until I can afford LT headers and leave the stock mufflers in because I think with headers all the way back to louder mufflers it would be too loud..

Lriver1004

Gotcha. That's def a concern of mine as well. I may have them put in a nice v-band set-up in there. My biggest concern was performance loss though.

Lriver1004

So do you still have the primary cats in place?

Bahnstormer

I recently had Eurocharged mid-length headers installed on my 2003 E500 and am really happy with the results. Got them ceramic coated at a local shop before they were put in. Personally, I would be a little leery of buying used headers, especially if they don't come with downpipes. This is a project you only want to do once, and have done right so you don't encounter issues down the road. I called around numerous local European Indy mechanics before I found a guy that used to work for Renntech and had performed the installation many times before. Just my two cents.

new55

what brand coating did you use ? what did you pay for that to be done ? i have read reviews and arguments pro/con to have this done so i am wrestling with it being worth the money or not

thanks

Lriver1004

I see where you're coming from. I guess I'm not too worried about not having the downpipes since my cousin has an exhaust shop and can fab the headers to my exhaust. I will install the rest on my own. But I agree that I wouldn't want to do it more than once.

Bahnstormer

It was a local shop that does ceramic coating and it cost around $230 for both the headers and downpipes. I would highly recommend it as the coating helps keep underhood temps down and the headers still look the same as the day they were installed.

​http://www.hotshotusa.net​​​​​​

Lriver1004

I installed the headers and was able to use a generic 3 bolt flange. The install was a huge PITA. Took me about 6 hours! I dont think someone could pay me to install headers on another E55 ha! End rant.
The local exhaust shop only could only do crush bent tubing but the butt dyno feels pretty good regardless. I'm just waiting on my RaceIQ tune from Tony to get rid of that pesky CEL and get the most out of the headers. I'm going to order a mandrel bend kit and have my exhaust fabbed up from the headers to the rear section of the exhaust.
Should I go 3" inch or 2.5"???

tw2

Post a photo of the bend. Mandrel is much better but if it is working fine I wouldn't bother changing it. You dealt with the extremely restrictive bottleneck in the system already. The rest of the exhaust isn't bad. Unless you have a very high performance goal consider leaving it. Most people only play around with it for the sake of noise.

Lriver1004

Well the thing is that the exhaust was replaced up to the rear section of the car with 2.5 crush bend and a ghetto fabulous x-pipe. That's why I'm considering redoing it all with mandrel pipes.

Lriver1004

Lriver1004

tlambert

tw2

Not ideal, I would use stock sized pipe. It flows plenty and you won't have a transition at the back or excessive noise issues.

Lriver1004

Nah, not really. It might just be the angle of the pic.